


From the Stone

by octopus_fool



Series: Khazâd October [5]
Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-13
Updated: 2015-10-13
Packaged: 2018-04-25 04:12:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 674
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4946236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/octopus_fool/pseuds/octopus_fool
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Durin awakes and finds his urge to create.</p>
            </blockquote>





	From the Stone

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [Khazâd October](http://a-grump-of-dwarves.tumblr.com/post/128714611270/khaz%C3%A2d-october), Day 5 – Durin.

He awoke. The only thing he saw was darkness and he flinched back, thinking the hammer was about to strike him. But then he realised he was laying face-down on the ground and he turned around. There was stone below him, to his sides and behind him. When he looked up, there was more stone. Only when he looked forward could he see light.

Curious, he got up. His legs felt stiff as he walked. Perhaps he had been still for too long. He looked around, remembering the others, remembering the words his Maker had taught him, remembering his name. But Durin was alone.

So he walked on. The stone widened around him until it gave way to light, the platform of rock below his feet and the walls of the cave behind him the only solid things remaining. Durin blinked in the light of thousands of sparks in the sky above him. His heart began burning with the desire to work them into something even more beautiful. He longed to shape them into constellations of his own, to form wonders with his own hands.

But as much as Durin stretched, he could not reach them, not even when he climbed onto the tallest rock on the platform. It could not be done, Durin realised. Still, his desire to create had awoken.

Durin looked around. There were a few strange constructions of poles and thin planes standing on the ledge, the ones his Maker had called majâd, the beings growing from roots. At least Durin supposed they were majâd, he wasn’t quite sure because they were standing still instead of growing, but when he pulled one of them from its crack between the stones, the roots became visible.

More of the majâd were placed beyond the platform, their roots holding onto the stones below Durin, some of them much larger than him. The rocks too dropped in front of him, only to become larger and form mountains and ranges, much like the one his cave was set in. The world was immense, much larger than his Maker’s forge. And Durin wanted to add his part.

The majd in his hand was bendable and Durin tried forming it. It kept bending back to a resemblance of its old shape. Durin crossed its ends twice and pulled at it. The green pole broke. Disappointed, Durin threw it over the platform. He did not need to waste his efforts on things that broke at the slightest strain.

Instead, Durin examined the stones lying about. They seemed stable enough. He soon realised that some stones chipped when struck with different stones. Before long, Durin had shaped the head of a hammer just like the one in his memory.

The only problem was that he had nothing to swing it by. Durin looked around and his eyes fell on one of the sturdier majâd with a hard pole and decided this must be the wood his Maker had spoken of. The pole only shook when he pulled at it. He looked at his hammer. Following an impulse, Durin took the hammer head in both hands and hit the pole with it as hard as he could. It snapped. The result wasn’t perfect, but it would do for now.

Durin set to work chipping away at the end of the piece of wood with a sharp piece of stone to create a slit into which he could set the hammer. When he was done, he took some of the other majâd and twisted them together. To Durin’s relief, this made them somewhat more durable and he wound them around the place where hammer and wood met to make sure the hammer stayed in place.

Satisfied, he swung his hammer. It was perfect. He would see what else he could create with it once he had slept. His hammer in his hand, Durin walked back into the cave. With it by his side, he would be able to defend himself against whatever tried to harm him, save perhaps his Maker’s hammer.


End file.
